• Pinboard Links,  The Morning Flap

    The Morning Flap: March 6, 2013

    Hugo Chavez

    These are my news headlines for March 5th through March 6th:

    • Hugo Chavez, passionate but polarizing Venezuelan president, dead at 58 – Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who went from a young conspiratorial soldier who dreamed of revolution to the fiery anti-U.S. leader of one of the world’s great oil powers, died March 5 in Caracas of complications from an unspecified cancer in his pelvic area.He was 58 and had been president since 1999, longer than any other democratically elected leader in the Americas. Vice President Nicolas Maduro announced the death.Mr. Chavez first revealed in a brief, dramatic television address in June 2011 that he had undergone two surgical procedures in Cuba. He would go under the knife two more times, greatly weakening the once robust leader. Mr. Chavez had been elected in October 2012 to a third six-year term. But he missed his swearing-in ceremony on Jan. 10 while lying gravely ill in a Havana hospital after undergoing what his aides had called a complex operation a month before.

      The country was plunged into an institutional crisis, with Mr. Chavez’s foes accusing the government of violating the constitution. But Mr. Chavez’s lieutenants managed to buy time until their leader’s pre-dawn return to Venezuela on Feb. 18. He remained at a Caracas military hospital, with his Twitter account bursting out messages such as “Onward toward victory always!! We will live and we will triumph!!”

      As an obscure 37-year-old lieutenant colonel, Mr. Chavez had led a failed coup in 1992 against President Carlos Andres Perez’s government. Six years later, on Dec. 6, 1998, Mr. Chavez was elected president in a landslide after pledging to replace a broken, corrupt political system and redistribute the country’s substantial oil-fueled wealth.

    • Jeb Bush is back in the spotlight — and thinking about 2016 – Former Florida governor Jeb Bush, who has remained on the sidelines since his older brother left the White House with dismal ratings four years ago, has jumped back into the political fray this week with a new book, wall-to-wall television interviews and a round of public speaking engagements.His appearances mark a change in approach for Bush, 60, who has operated as more of a Republican elder statesman since leaving Tallahassee in 2007 but is now clearly considering a run for the White House.
    • Journalists as Ring Wraiths – Today’s Washington journalists are like J. R. R. Tolkien’s ring wraiths, petty lords who wanted a few shiny golden Obama rings — only to end up as shrunken slaves to the One.The Bob Woodward/Ron Fournier/Lanny Davis psychodrama is another small reminder that the Obama administration continues to assume that the press should be little more than a veritable Ministry of Truth. Its proper duty is to serve the White House and promote the progressive agenda of Barack Obama. Any were considered suspect who questioned whether those exalted ends should really be achieved by any means necessary — but they were so few and far between that it mattered little.
    • Massachusetts needs a waiver from Obamacare rules for small-business health plans – Massachusetts has made a concerted effort in the last few years to rein in health care costs for small businesses. But new federal regulations written to implement the Affordable Care Act threaten to undercut those efforts — and saddle thousands of Bay State businesses with big increases in premiums.
    • God and Jeb at CPAC – CPAC Has Become the Defender of the Status Quo – John McCain’s presidential campaign manager from four years ago, Steve Schmidt, has compared the upcoming Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) to the “Star Wars bar scene.”Reflecting on the dysfunctional 2008 freak show that passed for a campaign against Barack Obama, Mr. Schmidt would know.The conference’s problem, for many longtime participants, is not the diversity and raucous freedom one might expect to find in a social club on an alien planet. The quandary is that what is now the largest gathering of conservative activists in the nation has wandered far from its original intent, which was a rejection of the status quo.

      In the old days, the event represented the best intellectual revolutionary elements of the conservative movement. Panel after panel would argue and debate issues such as abortion, foreign aid, spending policies and about what the true Holy Grail of conservatism entailed – defending institutions or individuals?

      The conference was always separate and apart from the GOP establishment, even in the Reagan years. Today it no longer represents a joyous insurgency but is instead part of the Washington political establishment.

    • The Mighty Jeb Bush Comes Down to Earth – Bush’s flip flop on immigration will doom any chance he had for a 2016 Presidential race.
    • Boehner Pledges to Stick to the ‘Hastert Rule’ – Speaker John A. Boehner sought to assure his conference on Tuesday that the “Hastert rule” is still regular practice, on the heels of breaking it for the third time this Congress.Republicans breached the rule — under which the speaker only brings forward bills that enjoy support from the “majority of the majority” — last week when a reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act passed with a majority of Democratic votes. Of three major bills passed this session, two have passed in violation of the rule. The House passed the fiscal-cliff deal Jan. 1 despite the rule as well.The rule — named after former Speaker J. Dennis Hastert, R-Ill. — may be tested again in coming months on legislation relating to immigration and gun control, although a GOP leadership aide said that scenario is highly unlikely.
    • Analyst estimates Chávez’s family fortune at around $2 billion – But, u can’t take it with you RT @DRUDGE_REPORT: CLAIM: Chavez Had Amassed Private Fortune of $2 Billion…
    • CDC Warns Of Spread Of Deadly Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria « CBS Miami – CDC Warns Of Spread Of Deadly Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria #tcot
    • Twitter / RepJoseSerrano: Hugo Chavez was a leader that … – RT @jeffemanuel: So, is it McCarthyism to declare @RepJoseSerrano a dyed-in-the-wool, dictator-supporting socialist?
    • Untitled (http://bigstory.ap.org/article/chavezs-successor-venezuela-nicolas-maduro) – RT @AP: Hugo Chavez’s successor in Venezuela: Nicolas Maduro: -CC
    • Jeb Bush immigration comments spark uproar – Kevin Robillard – POLITICO.com – RT @politico: Jeb Bush immigration comments spark uproar:
    • Jeb Bush: Actually, I could support a path to citizenship in theory « Hot Air – Jeb Bush is all over the place on immigration. He is as much feckless as his brother W was wrong #tcot
    • Video: Jeb Bush on 2016: ‘I’ve Decided . . . Not to Think About It for a While’ – Former Florida governor Jeb Bush continued to fend off speculation about his 2016 presidential prospects this morning, saying that he hasn’t decided whether he’ll run and won’t for at least another couple years.“I’ve decided not to think about it for a while, and I have the discipline to do that,” Bush told CBS’s Charlie Rose, and that his focus is on being a voice in immigration reform, the subject of his new book, Immigration Wars. When co-host Norah O’Donnell suggested that it was interesting he hadn’t ruled out running, Bush laughed it off: “I guess that’s interesting, I don’t find it that interesting.”
    • Rubio in ‘same place’ as Jeb Bush on immigration – POLITICO.com – “@politico: Marco Rubio in “same place” as Jeb Bush on immigration, @mkraju reports: “
    • Ken Jeong AHA Hands-Only CPR video – YouTube – RT @RaDragon: Disco is NOT dead 😉 PSA: Hands-Only CPR
    • Support @Flap – Gregory Flap Cole in the 2013 Los Angeles Marathon – Locum Tenens (Temporary) Dentist – Gregory Cole, D.D.S. – Support @Flap – Gregory Flap Cole in the 2013 Los Angeles Marathon #tcot
    • Jeb Bush’s False-Flag Operation – Jeb Bush generated quite a bit of publicity for his new book yesterday by suggesting that amnestied illegal immigrants should not be eligible for citizenship. Instead, he’s suggesting they be given some kind of permanent status that would provide them work cards, Social Security numbers, driver’s licenses, and the right to travel abroad and return, but not allow for eventual naturalization — in effect, a kind of permanent guestworker program or a green-card-lite, rather than an actual green card. This is consistent with suggestions from other pro-amnesty Republicans, including Senator Rubio and a group of House members working up an amnesty deal.Unfortunately, it’s a trick.
    • Two more casualities of Twitter’s power play | Android Central – @TweetDeck better give mobile users a better app RT @androidcentral: Two more casualities of Twitter’s power play
    • Jeb Bush’s Poorly Timed Flip-Flop on Immigration – NationalJournal.com – Jeb knows exactly what he is doing |Jeb Bush’s Poorly? Timed Flip -Flop on Immigration
    • A Market Solution to Immigration Reform | RealClearPolitics – A Market Solution to Immigration Reform #tcot
  • Pinboard Links,  The Morning Flap

    The Morning Flap: March 5, 2013

    Jeb BushFormer Florida Governor Jeb Bush is interviewed on Fox News and discusses his new immigration book

    These are my links for February 28th through March 5th:

    • Jeb Bush’s False-Flag Operation – Jeb Bush generated quite a bit of publicity for his new book yesterday by suggesting that amnestied illegal immigrants should not be eligible for citizenship. Instead, he’s suggesting they be given some kind of permanent status that would provide them work cards, Social Security numbers, driver’s licenses, and the right to travel abroad and return, but not allow for eventual naturalization — in effect, a kind of permanent guestworker program or a green-card-lite, rather than an actual green card. This is consistent with suggestions from other pro-amnesty Republicans, including Senator Rubio and a group of House members working up an amnesty deal.Unfortunately, it’s a trick.
  • Pinboard Links,  The Morning Flap

    The Morning Flap: February 26, 2013

    John Kerry

    These are my news headlines for February 25th through February 26th:

  • Pinboard Links,  The Morning Flap

    The Morning Flap: February 21, 2013

    brill.pill9.indd

    These are my news headlines for February 21st:

    • Bitter Pill: Why Medical Bills Are Killing Us | TIME.com – 1. Routine Care, Unforgettable Bills
      When Sean Recchi, a 42-year-old from Lancaster, Ohio, was told last March that he had non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, his wife Stephanie knew she had to get him to MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. Stephanie’s father had been treated there 10 years earlier, and she and her family credited the doctors and nurses at MD Anderson with extending his life by at least eight years.Because Stephanie and her husband had recently started their own small technology business, they were unable to buy comprehensive health insurance. For $469 a month, or about 20% of their income, they had been able to get only a policy that covered just $2,000 per day of any hospital costs. “We don’t take that kind of discount insurance,” said the woman at MD Anderson when Stephanie called to make an appointment for Sean.
    • GOP Has Trouble Settling on Candidates Who Can Win – One of the interesting things about recent elections is that Republicans have tended to do better the farther you go down the ballot.They’ve lost the presidency twice in a row, and in four of the last six contests. They’ve failed to win a majority in the U.S. Senate, something they accomplished in five election cycles between 1994 and 2006.But they have won control of the House of Representatives in the last two elections, and in eight of the last 10 cycles.And they’ve been doing better in elections to state legislatures than at any time since the 1920s.

      One reason for this is that, as I have written, Democratic voters are clustered in large metropolitan areas, which helps them in the Electoral College but hurts in legislatures with equal-population districts.

      But there’s another reason, which has been particularly glaring in races for the U.S. Senate: candidate quality.

    • The future of free-market healthcare – Over nearly a century, progressives have pressed for a national, single-payer healthcare system. When it comes to health reform, what have conservatives stood for?For far too long, conservatives have failed to coalesce around a long-term vision of what a free-market healthcare system should look like. Republican attention to healthcare, in turn, has only arisen sporadically, in response to Democratic initiatives.Obamacare is the logical byproduct of this conservative policy neglect. President Barack Obama’s re-election was a strategic victory for his signature healthcare law. Once the bulk of the program begins to be implemented in 2014 — especially its trillions of dollars in new health-insurance subsidies — it will become politically impossible to repeal. And as the baby boomers retire and Obamacare is fully operational, government health spending will reach unsustainable levels.The great irony of Obama’s triumph, however, is that it can pave the way for Republicans to adopt a comprehensive, market-oriented healthcare agenda.  The market-oriented prescription drug program in Medicare has controlled the growth of government health spending. Similarly, conservatives can use Obamacare’s important concession to the private sector — its establishment of subsidized insurance marketplaces — as a vehicle for broader entitlement reforms.
    • The Pro-Growth Sequester – The Obama administration is whipping up hysteria over the sequester budget cuts and their impact on the economy, the military, first providers, and so forth and so on. Armageddon. But if you climb into the Congressional Budget Office numbers for 2013, you see a much lighter and easier picture than all the worst-case scenarios being conjured up by the administration.For example, the $85 billion so-called spending cut is actually budget authority, not budget outlays. According to the CBO, budget outlays will come down by $44 billion, or one quarter of 1 percent of gross domestic product (GDP is $15.8 trillion). What’s more, that $44 billion outlay reduction is only 1.25 percent of the $3.6 trillion government budget.
    • Ted Cruz knocks Obama on immigration – Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) says President Barack Obama wants to “scuttle” immigration reform by injecting a path to citizenship into the debate so Democrats can keep the issue alive for political gain.“The president has been focusing on amnesty — a path to citizenship that skips ahead of the line,” the freshman tea party senator said Wednesday at a speech in Dallas, according to The Dallas Morning News. “That, he knows, is a position not supported by a great many Americans and not a position that will achieve bipartisan cooperation. It’s designed to scuttle the bill.”
    • Foreign Buyers Hop on Rental Trend – US Masters, a real-estate investment trust that has raised $276 million, primarily from Australian retirees, is one of a handful of foreign firms that are betting on the U.S. housing recovery by buying houses at discount prices.The business of buying-and-renting houses, long dominated by local mom-and-pop investors, has morphed over the past two years into one of the hottest investments on Wall Street. Dozens of pension investors and private-equity firms, such as Blackstone Group LP BX -2.19% and Colony Capital LLC, are clamoring to buy homes in beaten-up markets, sometimes using money from foreign co-investors.
    • Majority of U.S. citizens say illegal immigrants should be deported – More than half of U.S. citizens believe that most or all of the country’s 11 million illegal immigrants should be deported, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll released on Wednesday that highlights the difficulties facing lawmakers trying to reform the U.S. immigration system.The online survey shows resistance to easing immigration laws despite the biggest push for reform in Congress since 2007.
    • Missile Defense Tests Successful, but Future of Program in Doubt – The unanswered question is whether the Missile Defense Agency will be permitted to advance this space-based missile defense capability—whether through the STSS program or the PTSS program—to a deployed constellation at all. There should be little doubt that arms control advocates, both inside the Administration and out, are livid that this test took place at all, let alone that it was successful. This is because a space-based missile defense capability is incompatible with the Administration’s arms control agenda.
    • Gov. Scott agrees to expand Florida Medicaid program – Gov. Rick Scott announced plans Wednesday to expand Medicaid coverage to roughly 900,000 more people under the federal health overhaul, a surprise decision from the vocal critic of President Barack Obama’s plan.Scott said he will ask the Legislature to expand the program under a bill that would expire in three years, after which it would require renewed legislative support. He’s the seventh Republican governor so far to propose expanding the taxpayer-funded health insurance program.
    • Tea Party and Republican groups launch Hispanic outreach – Tea Party and Republican groups launch Hispanic outreach #tcot
    • How former Rep. Jesse Jackson, Jr. Spent His Campaign Funds – Former Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D) pleaded guilty today “to a conspiracy to siphon about $750,000 in federal campaign funds for their personal use,” the Chicago Tribune reports.”About 3,100 personal purchases were made on campaign credit cards, totaling $582,772.58… Prosecutors said $60,000 was spent on restaurants, nightclubs and lounges; $31,700 on personal airfare; $16,000 on sports clubs and lounges; $17,000 on tobacco shops; $5,800 on alcohol; $14,500 on dry cleaning; $8,000 on grocery stores and $6,000 at drug stores.””In one of the more exotic purchases, Jackson used campaign funds in the spring of 2011 to pay a taxidermist in Montana $7,058 for two mounted elk heads to be shipped to his office in Washington. This was the beginning of an FBI sting, according to court documents.”
    • California Dept. of Transportation: ‘Be Sure to Black Out the ‘United States’ and [the] Motto’ | The Weekly Standard – California Dept. of Transportation: ‘Be Sure to Black Out the ‘United States’ and [the] Motto’
    • Pentagon informs Congress of plans to furlough 800K civilians – Pentagon informs Congress of plans to furlough 800K civilians #tcot
    • The sequester blame game – Much depends on the timing of any economic turndown. If it occurs this year, but is followed by improvement in 2014, the political consequences are not likely to be significant. If the economy is in trouble in mid-2014, then all bets are off. For this reason, among others, Republicans should reject out of hand the president’s efforts to postpone the sequester for a year. In any event, the sequester would make the Republicans a full partner with Obama when it comes to the state of the economy.In the end, though, Republicans are committed, as they should be, to cutting government spending. This is never a politically risk-free proposition. But it’s better to get a head start now, when blame might well be shared, than to save all the work for when (if) Republicans gain control of the government and will absorb all of the blame.JOHN adds: My own view is that Republicans should happily take credit for the spending cuts represented by the sequester. They aren’t anywhere near enough, but they are the most substantial spending cuts, I believe, in my lifetime. I think 75% of the population will be pleasantly surprised to learn that Congress is actually capable of cutting spending.
    • The GOP’s astonishingly bad message on sequester cuts – None of which addresses the Republican problem on the sequester. If the problem is one of substance — that is, if GOP leaders truly believe the cuts threaten national security but are nevertheless supporting them — then Republicans have put themselves into an untenable situation. If, as is more likely, the problem is one of message — that is, if Republicans believe the cuts are not only manageable without threatening national security but are also desirable as a first step toward controlling spending — then the Boehner article is sending all the wrong signals.
    • Video: John McCain Gets Testy With Arizona Voter Questioning Immigration Amnesty – Flap’s Blog – Video: John McCain Gets Testy With Arizona Voter Questioning Immigration Amnesty #tcot
    • Mistake in First California Carbon Auction Raises Questions About Secrecy | KQED News Fix – Mistake in First California Carbon Auction Raises Questions About Secrecy
    • Second cap and trade auction needs big bucks | news10.net – Second cap and trade California auction needs big bucks
    • We predicted there was no tax ‘windfall’ | CalWatchDog – We predicted there was no California tax ‘windfall’
    • The Morning Flap: February 20, 2013 – Flap’s Blog – The Morning Flap: February 20, 2013 #tcot
    • A Mighty Wind by Ben Boychuk – City Journal – A Mighty Wind – California Flatulence Jokes
  • Pinboard Links,  The Morning Flap

    The Morning Flap: February 20, 2013

    McCain Defends Immigration amnesty

    U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., listens to a question during a town hall, Tuesday, Feb. 19, 2013, in Sun Lakes, Ariz. McCain defended his proposed immigration overhaul to an angry crowd in suburban Arizona in the latest sign that this border state will play a prominent role in the national immigration reform debate AP (Photo/Matt York)

    These are my news headlines for February 20th:

  • Day By Day

    Day By Day January 9, 2013 – Back Door Man

    Day By Day cartoon of January 9, 2013Day By Day by Chris Muir

    Chris, it is difficult to tell the difference between President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner, isn’t it?

    Maybe the spontaneous whining and crying will give it away.

    The President has been smart though to not bother Boehner with the backdoor – but front and center.

    Obama has been playing Boehner like a fiddle – to the detriment of his Republican colleagues.

  • Del.icio.us Links,  The Evening Flap

    The Evening Flap: January 3, 2013

    These are my links for January 3rd.

    • Biden: Republicans had ‘epiphany’ on immigration – Vice President Joe Biden said Republicans have had a major realization in their approach to immigration reform in recent weeks.”Have you ever seen a time when Republicans have had a more rapid epiphany about immigration than they have this last election?” Biden said Thursday while speaking at an event for the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute in Washington.
    • There’s No ‘I’ in ‘Kumbaya’ – A Uniquely Polarizing President – We’re all talking about Republicans on the Hill and their manifold failures. So here are some things President Obama didn’t do during the fiscal cliff impasse and some conjecture as to why.He won but he did not triumph. His victory didn’t resolve or ease anything and heralds nothing but more congressional war to come.

      He did not unveil, argue for or put on the table the outlines of a grand bargain. That is, he put no force behind solutions to the actual crisis facing our country, which is the hemorrhagic spending that threatens our future. Progress there—even just a little—would have heartened almost everyone. The president won on tax hikes, but that was an emotional, symbolic and ideological victory, not a substantive one. The higher rates will do almost nothing to ease the debt or deficits.

    • Charles Krauthammer: Return of the real Obama – The rout was complete, the retreat disorderly. President Obama got his tax hikes — naked of spending cuts — passed by the ostensibly Republican House of Representatives. After which, you might expect him to pivot to his self-proclaimed “principle” of fiscal “balance” by taking the lead on reducing spending. “Why,” asked The Post on the eve of the final fiscal-cliff agreement, “is the nation’s leader not embracing and then explaining the balanced reforms the nation needs?”Because he has no interest in them. He’s a visionary, not an accountant. Sure, he’ll pretend to care about deficits, especially while running for reelection. But now that he’s past the post, he’s free to be himself — a committed big-government social democrat.
    • Boehner reelected as Speaker; nine Republicans defect in vote – Rep. John Boehner (R-Ohio) was reelected Speaker of the House on Thursday after a week of rumors of a possible GOP revolt.Boehner won a bare majority in a vote that saw nine Republicans vote for other GOP members, and several others who abstained from voting or voted “present.” Two years ago, Boehner won all 241 available GOP votes.
  • Chris Christie

    Video: Chris Christie Melts Down Over Pork-Laden Sandy Relief Bill

    [youtube]http://youtu.be/1eyOf8-jDtc[/youtube]

    In the above video, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie goes after Republican House Speaker John Boehner for among other things not taking his phone call.

    While we understand Christie’s frustration and escalation in what is obviously a personal vendetta between the two men, as so often happens, much was left unsaid. For example the fact that the proposed bill was also chock full of pork spending such as:

    • $150 million in funding for fisheries in Alaska,
    • $5.3 billion to the Army corps of engineers,
    • $56.8 million for charting the debris from last year’s Japanese tsunami,
    • $100 million for the federal Head Start day care program,
    • $20 million for a nationwide “water resources priorities study”,
    • $4 million for the … Kennedy Space Center?

    And others. Some more from the Weekly Standard:

    I grow tired of Christie’s histrionics. He obviously lacks discipline and restraint looking at him not getting his own way and his obesity.

    The voters of New Jersey may accept this type of conduct, but I won’t if he chooses to run for the Presidency.

  • John Boehner

    Will John Boehner be Ousted as Speaker?

    Boehner and CampSpeaker of the House John Boehner (R-OH) (front, in green tie) walks with Congressman Dave Camp (R-MI) (R) after a meeting with House Republicans about a “fiscal cliff” deal on Capitol Hill in Washington January 1, 2013

    This is a rumor over at Breitbart this morning after the Senate fiscal cliff compromise legislation was passed last night.

    American Majority Action spokesman Ron Meyer told Breitbart News late Tuesday that enough House Republicans have banded together in an effort to unseat House Speaker John Boehner from his position–they just need a leader to take up the mantle.

    “At least 20 House Republican members have gotten together, discussed this and want to unseat Speaker Boehner–and are willing to do what it takes to do it,” Meyer said. “That’s more than enough to get the job done, but the one problem these guys face is they need a leader to coalesce behind.”

    There will be NO leader and there will be NO ouster.

    No one has the stature to challenge Boehner and all of the House leadership supported the deal, regardless of their votes.

    Just a bunch of HOT AIR, due to the RIGHT’s unhappiness with last night’s vote.

    There will be new battlefronts in the near future (including sequesration and the debt limit), but replacing Boehner will not be one of them.

  • Fiscal Cliff,  John Boehner

    The House Fiscal Cliff Strategy: Shut Up and Pass a Bill

    Boehner and Obama What Should the GOP House Do About The Fiscal Cliff?

    epublican House Speaker John Boehner and President Obama at the White House on November 16, 2012

    Earth speaking to Republican House Speaker John Boehner on the “Fiscal Cliff” – shut up and pass a bill. You are not winning the discourse with the President.

    I told you before what to do and it is very simple.

    Pass an extension of the Social Security payroll tax cut and block its automatic rise from 4.2 percent of wages to 6.2 percent. To raise that tax now and scoop off the discretionary income of most of America’s families in this anemic economy makes no sense economically or politically.

    The House should then vote to extend the Bush tax cuts for another year, with a pledge to do tax reform — lowering tax rates in return for culling, cutting or capping deductions for the well-to-do in the new year.

    Then let Harry Reid work his will. If the Senate votes to let Social Security taxes rise, let Harry and his party explain this to the middle class that gets hammered in January. If the Senate votes to let the Bush tax cuts lapse for those over $200,000, decide in the caucus whether to negotiate — or to go home for Christmas and New Year’s.

    As for the automatic sequester that would impose $100 billion in cuts next year, half in defense, do nothing. Let it take effect. The budget has to be cut, and while these cuts are heavy on defense, the depth and mixture can be adjusted in the new year.

    Another week has gone by and nothing really has happened, except Obama has been beating up on the Republican brand. Boehner, you are not going to be doing any better than the above.

    So, just do it and get it over.